God Lives.
He is Our Father.
He Loves us.
If you don't agree with me, that's fine, but this is the premise on which I'm going to talk about why Scriptures are written, so be ready for that.
All member of the human race are God's children.
God loves his children and wants them to return to live with Him.
In order to return to the presence of God we need to do our very best to live by His standards.
In order for us to have His standards, He must reveal them to us.
So God appears to a prophet and tells him what His standards are.
Rather than appear to each and every church leader, God commands said prophet to write down the things God teaches him.
Now, He could have said "here's list of do's and don't's, it's a couple pages long, publish this across the globe"
But instead He said "I want all my children to know the story of how the earth was created. I want them to know of their first parents on the earth. In fact, I want a thorough history of my people written down, so that future generations can learn from both their marvelous experiences and their grievous mistakes."
And so Moses (first) was commanded to make a record. The first five books of The Old Testament were written by Moses. The Old Testament is the history of the people of Israel. But it's not a cohesive whole.
Let's take a break and discuss the origin of the word "Bible" according to Mirriam-Webster's Dictionary.
In ancient Greek the word Biblion means Book, and the word Bible is it's plural.
So the word Bible literally just means "Books". This kind of explains why we call it the The Holy Bible, ("The Holy Books") since the word Bible in and of itself does not even imply a relationship to anything sacred.
Okay, so the Bible is just a collection of books, which makes sense since every section of it is referred to as "The Book of..." (i.e. The First Book of Moses Called Genesis, The Book of The Prophet Jeremiah, etc).
in fact, the majority of the New Testament is a collection of letters written by Paul. Not at all a sequential narrative kept by one person. Rather, someone took all these letters and copied them into a "Bible" ("Books").
Now, over hundreds and thousands, of years these books were kept, copied, translated, stored, hidden, burned, re-copied, re-translated, etc.
It's a miracle so much of the Bible survived at all.
Now, considering whether or not there can be more scriptures than just the Bible:
If we consider the map of the world
The Bible was mostly written in the circled area (1). These teachings could then spread across most of Africa, Europe, and Asia from there. In fact, some of Paul's letters are written "to the saints in Asia", but there was no air mail to send these teachings to the Americas (2).
Remember when we talked about The Book of Mormon? This is why God also revealed His standards to the Nephites on that continent. So that His children all over the world would have His Word.
Another reason is because God knew that through all of the copying, translating, changing, extracting, re-translating, etc. that the Bible would not remain in its original form. I mean, how could it? The fact that there are hundreds of versions of the Bible attests to this.
In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, we also believe that two books called The Doctrine and Covenants and The Pearl of Great Price are scripture. The Doctrine and Covenants is a series of revelations given to the prophet Joseph Smith while he was organizing the Church once again on the earth.
God has not closed Heaven, and there is no reason for us to believe that He cannot reveal more scripture if He chooses to. In fact, there are some verses in the Book of Mormon that put it a little strongly:
Wherefore murmur ye, because that ye shall receive more of my word? Know ye not that the testimony of two nations is a witness unto you that I am God, that I remember one nation like unto another? Wherefore, I speak the same words unto one nation like unto another. And when the two nations shall run together the testimony of the two nations shall run together also.
And I do this that I may prove unto many that I am the same yesterday, today, and forever; and that I speak forth my words according to mine own pleasure. And because that I have spoken one word ye need not suppose that I cannot speak another; for my work is not yet finished; neither shall it be until the end of man, neither from that time henceforth and forever. (2 Nephi: 29: 8-9)
For the whole chapter follow this link: 2nd Nephi Chapter 29
I believe that God reveals His will to His children, and that his inspired prophets have written these things down for us to read in these days. I also believe that He can reveal more if He so chooses.
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The next few posts I will address The Big Questions.
Why am I here?
Where do I come from?
Where am I going after this life?
I know these are clichés, but don`t you want to know the answers?!?!
I know that the teachings of the Church are true, and that we have the real answers to these questions.
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